VERBAL AND VISUAL REPRESENTATION OF MEN IN NIVEA FOR MEN PRINT ADVERTISEMENTS.

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VERBAL AND VISUAL REPRESENTATION OF MEN

IN NIVEA FOR MEN PRINT ADVERTISEMENTS

A RESEARCH PAPER

Submitted to the English Education Department of the Faculty of Language and Arts Education of the Indonesia University of Education as Partial Fulfillment of

the Requirements for Sarjana Sastra Degree

by

Dinnawaty Annisa Puspadewi

0809076

ENGLISH EDUCATION DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION

INDONESIA UNIVERSITY OF EDUCATION

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VERBAL AND VISUAL REPRESENTATION OF

MEN

IN NIVEA FOR MEN PRINT

PAGE OF APPROVAL

Verbal and Visual Representation of Men in Nivea for Men

Print Advertisements

By

Dinnawaty Annisa Puspadewi

0809076

Approved by:

Main Supervisor

Iwa Lukmana, M.A,. P.hD. NIP. 196611271993031002

The Head of English Education Department Faculty of Language and Art Education

Indonesia University of Education

Prof. Dr. Didi Suherdi, M.Ed NIP. 196211011987121000

Co Supervisor

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ABSTRACT

The research paper is entitled Verbal and Visual Representation of Men in

Nivea for Men Advertisements. It is aims to investigate the verbal and visual

representation of men in Nivea for Men print advertisements and the ideologies behind the representation. The present study is largely qualitative using the frameworks of Critical Discourse Analysis proposed by Fairclough (1995) and Visual Theory by Kress and van Leeuwen (1990). The data include six Nivea for Men print advertisements that were released in 2008 until 2012. The analysis of verbal texts focuses on transitivity, inclusion and exclusion of elements of social events, and concreteness or abstraction of representation of social events. Meanwhile, mood, subjectivity, social distance, and modality analyses are employed in exploring the visual texts. The result of the study reveals that Nivea for Men print advertisements portray men as active, confident, and attractive. The men in Nivea for Men advertisement was also show their feminine side. It is also found that the ideologies underlying the representation are consumerism and metrosexuality.

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Nowadays, advertisements are familiar thing for many people. According to Williamson (2007), an advertisement becomes an unavoidable part of everyone's life. We can easily find advertisements everywhere in our daily lives in various mediums, such as television, radio, movie, magazine, newspaper, billboard or even on the bus seat. In fact, “the original word of 'advertisement' derives from a Latin word ad-vere which means conveying thoughts and ideas to others” (Klepper, 1986 in Widyatama 2005:14). In this context, advertisement has a similar meaning with communication.

O’Guinn et al. (2006) states that in communicating, people are persuaded to

do something. In this sense, an advertisement as one form of communication has an essential part that is, a message. A message in advertisements is aims to informe people about the product and persuade them to buy the product. It deeply affects our purchasing behaviours.

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the product. This is because the consumers tend to be attracted by advertisements with good texts which are also supported by enchanting images. It is in line with Kress and van Leeuwen (1990) who describe that image is part of text, particularly non-verbal text and it supports verbal text to create meaning.

In addition, the copywriters tend to use models in creating images of a product. They use specific objects in promoting a product. For example, the advertisements of cosmetics products that use women as the model. On the other hand, men are involved as the model in the advertisements of cigarettes and automotives product. In this sense, the advertisement is created by considering gender stereotype. However, there are some cases in which the advertisements do not follow those stereotypes.

There are some products which are usually associated with women stereotypes, but now those products are used by men as well. One of them is grooming products. Nowadays, there are so many grooming products that are created and targetted for men such as facial foam, moisturizer, deodorant, and parfume in various brand. One of them is Nivea for Men.

Nivea is one of the most recognized skin and beauty care brands in the

world. Nivea creates Nivea for Men brand in order to fulfill men's need towards skin care. In addition, Nivea for Men received the highest ranking in the Most Trusted Brands For Men for the ninth time in a row based on survey conducted by the Reader's Digest magazine (2011). It seems that men models and tagline in

Nivea for Men print advertisements tend to influence and contribute to the

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By looking at those issues, the present study attempts to investigate the representation of men in Nivea for Men print advertisements both verbally and visually, then it attempts to reveal the ideologies underlying the representation.

There are some studies which have been conducted in examining the representation of men in print advertisement (Tanner&McNair, 2005; Godeo, 2005; Ahmad, 2009; and Hernandez, 2010). In investigating the representation of men in print advertisement, Tanner&McNair (2005) revealed that in a sample of advertisements from selected magazines in 1983 and 2003, men were represented as being sensual or attractive. White male were portrayed more positively than the ethnic minority men in advertisements. Meanwhile, Godeo (2005), Ahmad (2009) and Hernandez (2010) discovered that men in men's cosmetics products and men in men's magazine were portrayed as men in different visions of masculinity, that is the new man or metrosexual man.

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Unlike those previous studies, the present study examines the verbal and visual representation of men in print advertisements and attempts to reveal the ideologies underlying representation. For the sake of data, this study uses selected advertisement of Nivea for Men print advertisements. Furthermore, the study employs the frameworks of Critical Discourse Analysis proposed by Fairclough (1995) and Visual theory of mood, subjectivity, social distance and modality by Kress and Van Leeuwen (1990) to investigate the verbal representation and visual representation in the texts and image of advertisement.

1.2 Research Questions

The present study is guided by the following questions:

1. How are men represented verbally in Nivea for Men print advertisements? 2. How are men represented visually in Nivea for Men print advertisements? 3. What are the ideologies underlying the representation?

1.3 Aims of the Study

The purposes of the study are as follows:

1. to investigate the verbal representation of men in Nivea for Men print advertisements

2. to investigate the visual representation of men in Nivea for Men print advertisements

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1.4 Scope of the Study

This study specifically investigates the representation of men both verbally and visually in Nivea for Men print advertisements which were released in 2008 until 2012 by using Critical Discourse Analysis as the basic framework of the study. In addition, this study applies visual theory of mood, subjectivity, social distance and modality analysis (Kress and van Leeuwen, 1990) to discover the visual texts of the advertisement.

1.5 Significance of the Study

This study contributes to the development of the language and image analysis, primarily in the investigation of the representation of men in Nivea for

Men print advertisements. Considering the rapid development of men's grooming

products in Indonesia, this study hopes to help people to have a better understanding about both texts (verbal representation) and images (visual representation) in the advertising messages. This study is also expected to contribute to the development of the advertising industry especially in Indonesia by revealing the social interaction between the copywriter and the consumer.

1.6 Research Methods

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three levels of text analysis that are offered by Fairclough (1995), those are description, interpretation, and explanation.

The data were taken from men’s health magazine, www.niveaformen.com, www.beiersdorf.com, and www.visit4ads.com, which were released in 2008 until 2012. Six advertisements were selected as the data. The data were categorized based on the men's grooming products advertisement. This study used both clauses and images as the object of investigation. The analysis of transitivity, the inclusion and exclusion of element of social events, and the concreteness or abstraction representations of social events were applied in analyzing the advertisements verbal texts (see Fairclough, 2003). Meanwhile, visual mood, subjectivity, social distance, and modality in image analysis were employed to analyze the visual texts (see Kress and van Leeuwen, 1990).

1.7 Clarification of the Terms

In order to avoid ambiguity or confusion, there are terms that should be clarified. 1. Representation is a term which refers to the way every aspect of the world is

described through discourse (Fairclough, 2003).

2. Print Advertisement is an advertisement that printed on paper, be it

newspaper, magazines, newsletters, booklets, flyers, direct mail, or anything else that would be considered a portable printed medium (www.advertising.about.com)

3. Verbal texts are defined as "texts whose meanings are realized through

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4. Visual texts are defined as "texts whose meanings are realized through

paintings or photographs" (Kress and van Leeuwen, 1990:4).

5. Ideology is representation of aspects of the world, which can be shown to

contribute, to establishing, maintaining and changing social relations of power, domination and exploitations (Fairclough, 2003).

1.8 Organization of the Paper

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CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter contains the methodological aspects of the study. It covers four sections; formulation of the problem, research design, data collection, and data analysis, which have been briefly explained in Chapter I.

3.1 Formulation of the Problems

The problem of the study is formulated in the following questions:

1. How are men represented verbally in Nivea For Men print advertisements? 2. How are men represented visually in Nivea For Men print advertisements? 3. What are the ideologies underlying the representation?

3.2 Research Design

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Furthermore, visual text analysis was aplied to support the procedure above. It focused on the images which depicted men in the Nivea For Men advertisements. The analysis relied on the work of Kress and van Leeuwen (1990). In revealing representations depicted in the text, the images were analyzed by using the visual mood, subjectivity, social distance and visual system of modality. The data which were found from the linguistic and visual mood analysis of the text (description) served as the basis for the interpretation and social analysis (explanation).

3.3 Data Collection

The data were collected by using purposive sampling. Since the main goal of purposive sampling is to focus on particular object, the data were selected intentionally on grooming products for men in order to answer the research question and simplify the study. Purposive sampling, according to Maxwell (2005), is a strategy in which particular settings, persons or events are selected intentionally in order to provide important information that cannot be gotten as well from other choices.

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years by FHM Magazine and it also received the highest ranking in the Most Trusted Brands for the ninth time based on survey conducted by the Reader's Digest magazine. The selected advertisements were those that use the images of men. Six advertisements were selected as the data. The data were categorized based on the men's grooming products, such as deodorant, whitening oil control cream, moisturizing lotion, sensitive moisturizer, revitalizing eye cream, and anti-aging cream. Those advertisements were selected because they were relatively suitable for the problems of this study. The selected advertisements were analyzed by investigating the elements of advertisement that included verbal text and visual images.

3.4 Data Analysis

In analyzing the data, the present study drew upon the stages of texts analysis in CDA proposed by Fairclough (1995). The analysis consisted of three stages, namely description, interpretation, and explanation. In the description stage, the selected advertisement were analyzed by using linguistic-based CDA as offered by Fairclough. Here, transitivity, the inclusion or exclusion of elements of social events, and the concreteness or abstraction representations of social events, visual mood, subjectivity, social distance, and modality in images were examined.

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were also analyzed. As stated by Gerot and Wignell (1994: 54), "participants and circumstances are incumbent upon the doings, happenings, feelings and beings". In line with this, Halliday&Matthiessen (2004) state that the participants are involved in the process, while circumstances are associated in the process. However, the analysis of transitivity is important to determine what kind of process is dominant in the advertisement.

Moreover, Eggins (2004) states that transitivity represent the encoding of experimental meaning: meaning about the world, about experience, and about how we perceive and experience what is going on. Therefore, the analysis of transitivity in advertisement text can reveal how men are perceived and represented in this world.

The inclusion and exclusion of elements of social events were applied to find various elements of social events that were included or excluded in the text. Meanwhile, the concreteness or abstraction representations of social events were applied to investigate whether the clauses contained most concrete, more abstract/generalized, or more abstract.

Furthermore, the present study used visual theory proposed by Kress&van Leeuwen (1990) as the framework to describe the images. This framework was conducted to support the previous stage. The meanings in image were represented by mood, subjectivity, social distance, and modality.

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stage was explanation. This stage aimed to explain the data that is gained in the second stage by considering the interaction and social context. In this stage, ideological message was revealed by considering the linguistic features and the interpretation toward the features. Therefore, these three stages of analysis were used to reveal not only the verbal and visual representation of men in Nivea for

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CHAPTER V

CONCLUSSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

This is the last chapter of the study. This chapter presents the conclusions based on findings and discussions in the previous chapter. This chapter also offers the suggestions for further studies.

5.1 Conclusions

The study is concerned with the representation of men both verbally and visually in Nivea for Men print advertisements. By using Fairclough's (1995) approach to Critical Discourse Analysis, this study aims to investigate how men are represented verbally and how they are represented visually in Nivea for Men print advertisements. It also examines the ideologies underlying the representations.

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copywriters want to emphasize mental aspects that can be obtained by men who use the product.

Verbal representation above is supported by the visual representation. Based on the findings, it is found that men are visually portrayed as being dandy, attractive, stylish, and confident with their appearance. They seem to enjoy the skincare. They are also visually represented as men who use many kinds of grooming products that are related to women, such as whitening oil control cream, eye cream, moisturizing lotion, and anti-aging cream. This indicates that men also need grooming products as well as women.

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advantages of this by producing many kinds of skincare products for men's market.

These findings can further be explained that nowadays masculinity and femininity merge together. It can be seen that men are also use grooming products and do the skin care as well as women. Furthermore, there are many kinds of products which are usually identical with women such as whitening cream, eye cream, lip balm, etc, but now those products are created and used by men as well.

This promotes the idea of ‘new modern masculinity’. Since the texts are

constructed not only by the use of words but also the combination of words with other modalities, such as pictures, film or video images (Paltridge, 2006). In addition, advertisements can be a media to convey the ideology implicitly through both verbal and visual representations.

5.2 Suggestions

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